Gambia coalition calls for leader to step down immediately

DAKAR, Senegal – Gambia’s opposition has called on defeated President Yahya Jammeh to immediately step down from power, calling his rejection of the Dec. 1 election results illegal.

President Jammeh initially conceded defeat after official results showed that Gambians voted in president-elect Adama Barrow on Dec. 1. However last week Jammeh said that he no longer accepted his election loss and called for another vote, saying there were irregularities.

Jammeh’s ruling party said late Saturday that Jammeh’s statement was simply a prelude to the party challenging the results in a petition to the Supreme Court. By law, election results can be contested up to 10 days after the vote.

On Monday president-elect Barrow and the opposition coalition backing him denounced Jammeh’s statements.

“President Jammeh’s intentions were crystal clear … He rejected the results of the elections and declared them null and void. He also announced that new elections would be held under the auspices of a new (Independent Electoral Commission),” said coalition member Mai Fatty, in a statement.

The coalition said that any petition filed in the Supreme Court would show that Jammeh and his party “have no respect or regard for the Gambian people, are bent on ignoring their aspirations, and on undermining the transition process.”

The coalition also will not recognize any attempts by the outgoing president to appoint any Supreme Court judge to receive the petition, as he has no constitutional authority to do so, said Fatty, adding that Gambia’s Supreme Court hasn’t met for a year.

The coalition, made up of eight opposition parties who joined together to unseat Jammeh in elections, called on the ruling party to urge the outgoing president to respect the vote, and to “immediately stop inciting ethnic division and spreading false rumours.”

The president of the West Africa regional bloc, ECOWAS, has warned that Gambia could be plunged into violence by the president’s decision to reject election results. A number of international organizations and neighbouring countries have called for Jammeh, accused by human rights groups of abuses of power and suppressing political opponents, to step down.

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An Associated Press reporter in Banjul, Gambia contributed to this report.